“Few people realize that humanity has only visually documented an area of the seafloor roughly equivalent to the size of the São Paulo metropolitan area—the vast majority of the ocean floor remains unmapped, unexplored and unknown. But deep sea ecosystems are critical to global biodiversity, carbon storage and climate regulation, and are increasingly threatened by human activity such as deep-sea mining and ocean trawling. A map in the same report referenced above shows how little of the seafloor off Brazil’s own coast has been visually documented, underscoring the scale of the opportunity and the urgency of building public and political awareness.

“With support from the Schmidt Ocean Institute, Internews’ Earth Journalism Network (EJN) is pleased to announce an in-person three-day workshop opportunity for up to 10 Brazilian journalists to enhance their reporting on topics related to ocean science, marine biodiversity and deep-sea exploration.

“Selected participants will travel to Fortaleza, Brazil, to attend the workshop which will take place from September 14-16…. For participants based outside the Fortaleza area, EJN will cover non-refundable economy-class airfare, accommodation, meals, travel medical insurance and ground transportation costs related to workshop participation. Participants based in the Fortaleza area will receive modest per diem to cover their daily travel costs.”